Caribbean Food Delights Succession Planning
Challenge
With our workplace aging out, many of our employees will be retiring within the next 5 years, including our Chairman/President.
Actions
Although we have always cross trained our employees in case an employee leaves or something happens to them, we still need to hire someone to replace that key employee when they are no longer working for us. When a key employee has notified us in advance of their plans to retire, we start the hiring process. Sometimes, we use a recruiter when it’s a higher paid position. Like other companies, finding someone that fits our culture is one of the things that’s important to us. With our Chairman/President retiring this year, he had promoted me to CEO in 2016 and my sister to COO, so that he could start stepping back over the last four years. While he will still be involved in the business during our upcoming expansion, it will be very minimal. Not many companies have females at the top so we are proud to be one of the few that does. Our succession planning includes a transition plan where we collect information that will be helpful in making sure business continues after any key employee is no longer working for us, in addition to training their successor.
Outcomes
With our succession plan in place, we are prepared for when our key employees retire or if something happens to them before they retire. We feel confident that business will continue with the team we have in place.
Quote
It is heartbreaking to see the unrest that is going on in our communities, while we struggle to recover from a pandemic that has blindsided us and forced us to adapt as quickly as possible to survive. The recent senseless, tragedy of George Floyd and many others has caused an explosion of years of anger and frustration over the abuse of power and authority, and it touches all of us in a way that we cannot sit still. No one should have to fear for their life and or be treated unjustly because of the color of their skin. As Martin Luther King, Jr. said, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”
At Royal Caribbean Bakery and Caribbean Food Delights, we are proud to have a diverse workforce and we will continue to be fair, inclusive and considerate to foster a culture in which our employees feel respected and comfortable in speaking up. I have encouraged our management team to reach out to all employees to see how everyone is feeling and how we can help our employees cope during this difficult time. As for our community, we are always here to help in whatever ways we can. We are here for you.